Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Media player discussion (moved from 861v6 thread)

The Dune UI is ghetto. As is the remote control. You can't get on via NFS only SMB if you require pw. The image is excellent. The audio too. The seek and scan features rival any other media player. There will be an alpha fw next week that will take care of some issues and allow you to have a plain black screen vs. that windows-like cheap blue screen. There will also be a higher end unit with a superior drive and other tweaks due out shortly.

After having spent the time getting MyMovies to sort of function I think this player is the best option for now (pardon the cheesy bg image and the fonts that will all be remedied shortly in fw update we hope [not my library either]):






Of course the HD audio is a huge factor. We are in early stages of these media player companies and it is a shame Meridian has not exploited this BUT would they sell at the fair price point anyhow of $500 to $1,200 max? Soooloos says no and that's too bad since these are inexpensive to produce and M could piggyback of the Sooloos adding vid file formats and Bob Stuart and co would not even go to jail for potential piracy issues.

I have always said that if Sooloos supported DVD-A then I would aim to get one. At HH2 I recall M saying this was not possible due to security and licensing issues on the DVD-A. How come that dvdaudioextractor and DVDAExplorer are able to do so or am I missing the point?

David

Precisely. How come Dune and Popcorn hour can sell what they sell? Meridian would make a 1k excuses instead of exploit the opportunity. The licensing would be significantly less then for the F80 and if they priced it sensibly they would move a lot of units. But maybe M wants to price everything in the stratosphere to maintain image? The Faroudja chipped units that cost a fortune are today bested by inexpensive Chinese chips like Sigma in sub $500 media players.

Take new gen Intel mediaplayer chip and roll in Sooloos for movies and all formats of music and don't sell the storage nonsense simply the player and you're there. Upcharge for M speakerlink sure. But don't charge $5k or $15K for this. Reserve that pricing for speakers that a %age of new customers buying into the media player will aspire to. One can dream......along the stream......gently....

the dune UI is good enough for me, i can browse some bitmaps and select one to get a Bluray rip playing. There is not much more i want.

I emailed audiocominternational.com regarding upgrading my Dune player.
They already offer an upgrade for the Popcorn C-200, and they said the Dune upgrade will be available shortly.

Apparently its the master clock they upgrade, which controls all the other clocks, and it reduces jitter dramatically from the stock clock.
I might get it upgraded just to see what differences i can hear, when feeding it into the HD621.

If the HD621 performs apodizing and reclocking before feeding to my 861v4, i wonder if the 861v6 re-apodizes the digital input a second time?

Apodizing is performed at the same time the signal is upsampled.
Hence it is only performed once.

Regards,
Carl

Thanks Carl. I learn something new every day. Reading the threads i understand the more mips processing power you throw at Apodizing, the better it sounds...
Will be interesting to compare the HD621 into an 861v4 vs the new v6.

FYI

I noticed Squeezecentre updated today to 7.5 and now includes the Touch.

I've just looked at a few of the tutorials
http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/SqueezePlay_7.5.0_Release_Notes

The Music IP feature looks nice. Seems similar to the Swim feature of Sooloos. Swipe and flick seems pretty good also. Many other features there too.

Anyone got one up and running yet ?

Edit....just ordered one. Will report back later in the week myself.

I have the same opinion. I am more interested in picture and sound quality than fancy menus. I wonder if Meridian have any plans for a Meridian Media player?

I heard that Naim's media player has sold 3 yrs projection in 8 months. I don't know anything about the unit but it must be finding a good market.

If Naim are selling them that fast, it proves there is a healthy demand for media players at the high end as well.
It would be great news if Meridian decide to also produce a media player which would play movies and music.

It could not be a top of range model, as that would be competition for their Sooloos audio player.
Maybe thats why they haven't released a high end Bluray player?
The market is too competitive below the �600 level anyway. (The Oppo ;-)

But if Meridian could sell a media player which would fit into their low or midrange product line, i think there would be high demand for it. I would buy one.

Imagine, a Meridian midrange media player which played all movie and music formats and had apodising built in :-)

Unfortunately, imagining it will be all that you will do.

When Meridian put the Sooloos in front of HH2 the first comment was "Where's the video?"

If they don't have it on the "premium" model what hope for a low cost version?